Mike Davis has a point: UAB has to win to get in. (Birmingham News / Jeff Roberts)Joe Lunardi should have a lot to say next Monday as the guest speaker at the Birmingham Tip-off Club, but local hoop fans may not want to hear it.

ESPN's bracketologist releases his latest NCAA Tournament field every Monday, and his latest projections offer a little good news, but only a little.

Lunardi still has UAB in the field, but barely, as a No. 11 seed, and he has the Blazers playing No. 6 seed Tennessee in Jacksonville.

That would be a good matchup for the Blazers -- in terms of travel ease and opponent difficulty -- but that educated guess is down from a week ago, when Lunardi projected the Blazers as a No. 9 seed.

A No. 11 seed would make the Blazers one of the final handful of at-large selections, which gives credence to Mike Davis' postgame comments Saturday.

After losing to Marshall, his team's second straight home loss and third loss in the last four games, the UAB coach said the Blazers can't lose another regular-season game and hope to get an at-large bid.

So UAB has a lot of work to do, starting with the annual slogfest Wednesday at Southern Miss.

It's good news for the locals that Lunardi has two C-USA teams in the field in UAB and UTEP. It's bad news that he projects only three SEC teams in the field in Kentucky, Vanderbilt and Tennessee.

That would match last year's pitiful number of entries from the most powerful athletic conference in college sports.

Lunardi lists Florida, Ole Miss and Mississippi State among his First Four Out so there's hope for Mike Slive and company to have a happy Selection Sunday. But the league is running out of time and games to make a positive statement.